


You Found Your Home

by NoirAngel011



Series: Kali's Home- A Saga [1]
Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Canon Lesbian Character, Character Reflection, Character Study, El and Jonathan help her out, Female Character of Color, Heart-to-Heart, Kali and Hopper bonding, Kali doesn't know herself, Kali finds the home she deserves, Other, Sisters, but that's okay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-27
Updated: 2020-01-03
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:14:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,224
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21619705
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NoirAngel011/pseuds/NoirAngel011
Summary: Because no one writes stories about Kali being family with the Byers and Hoppers.It's a late night when Kali turns up at Joyce and Jim's door. Kali slowly becomes a part of the Hopper/Byers clan. She's got a lot to learn, but with some guidance from her newfound family, she can make it work.Takes place after season 3, in an everybody lives/nobody dies case. If Hopper married Joyce after the events of season 3 and El, Jonathan, and Will all live together. Takes place around December of 1985.
Relationships: Eleven | Jane Hopper & Kali Prasad, Joyce Byers & Kali Prasad, Joyce Byers/Jim "Chief" Hopper
Series: Kali's Home- A Saga [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1558156
Comments: 2
Kudos: 27





	1. Part I

**Author's Note:**

> There aren't enough of these stories. Going to be a series showing how Kali integrated into the family and soon discovers herself.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kali, against her better judgment, shows up at the Byers/Hopper's door. Joyce coddles her and Hopper is not pleased to see a murderer on his door step. Jane is ecstatic to have her sister with her once again and puts Hopper in his place. Joyce and Kali have a heart-to-heart and she learns that maybe these people are willing to look past her rocky background and give her a chance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> People need to write more of these stories with Kali truly having a family.

It was cold outside; almost freezing. Joyce would be worried to death if one of her kids were out in that snow. She was sitting on the couch at eleven pm, petting Chester while watching a soap opera with El and Hopper. Will and Jonathan were in their rooms, doing homework. With less than two weeks until Christmas break, everyone was cramming for their final semester tests.

El could feel something, something different. It took her a moment to figure out what it was. She had felt it once before.

It was that feeling she had when she found her sister. The feeling that had been ripped from her when she left, running away from her screams and cries of despair. The feeling that everything had slotted perfectly into place. Kali was close to her, she could feel it.

Suddenly, there was a knock at the door. El jumped at the sudden sound. She had a feeling who it was. At least, she hoped.

“Were you expecting anyone?” Joyce looked at Hopper.

Hopper just shook his head.

Hopper got up from his chair. It was heavily snowing outside, it wasn’t safe to be out there. He opened the door and was not prepared for what he saw.

“You must be Jim Hopper,” said the girl. She was brushing the snow from her hair. She was small, no taller than El and certainly shorter than Will.

“Who’s asking?” Joyce walked around the corner.

The girl didn’t answer, just pulled up the sleeve of her thin black leather jacket and held out her hand. It took Hopper a second to see what he was looking for. 

A small set of black numbers was tattooed onto her wrist. **008.** Joyce gasped, looking from the tattoo to the girl.

“Oh sweetie, come inside please. It’s freezing out there,” Joyce said as she swept the girl inside. The girl was clearly uncomfortable as Joyce poked and prodded at her, cleaning the snow off her hair and shoulders.

El slowly rounded the corner; she was almost afraid to see her sister again. She could recognize that pretty British accent anywhere. But still, it kind of hurt to see her, so small and shivering from the cold. Her big sister, broken but putting on a strong face. That was one of the things she loved about her.

“Kali!” She exclaimed. Kali whipped her head around to face her, stepping away from Joyce. She ran forward, grabbing the girl and pulling her into a hug. She smiled; now she was at least two inches taller than Kali.

“Jane,” Kali whispered into her shoulder, hugging her close. El smiled. It felt nice when Kali called her Jane, it was different. It was something entirely Kali and she never wanted to have that feeling taken away. She felt whole again, with Kali safe in her arms. She always worried about her; out in the dangerous streets of Chicago trying to take revenge on the bad men, but now she was back with her and El was not about to let her go.

When they pulled away from each other, Kali had tears in her eyes and El was actually crying, although she hadn’t realized until Kali brushed the tears off her face for her. They turned around to face Joyce and Hopper. They could hear Will and Jonathan descending the stairs. 

“Mom, Dad, This is my sister, Kali.” El wrapped her arm around Kali’s shoulders; not caring that her jacket was wet with melted snow. Kali seemed to almost cuddle into her, and El smiled 

“What? The sister that tried to make you kill an innocent man and his children?” Hopper snarled, leaning down into Kali's face. She cringed at the mention of that event; trying to back away from him. 

“I-” Kali started, but Hopper cut her off.

“I know about the things you’ve done; don’t think I’m stupid. I don’t know what you want but I will not let you hurt my family. Don’t think for a second that you could get away with anything.” Hopper was yelling at Kali now, and everyone could see that she was terrified. She was trying not to show it, but she was scared.

Kali took another two steps back, pulling herself away from El. 

“Dad! Don’t yell at her! You don’t know anything. She’s not going to hurt anybody here!” El moved in front of her, separating the two before Hopper had the chance to do something he'd regret. 

Kali didn’t say anything, just pressed herself up against the wall and waited for El to calm down.

“Hopper, calm down. She’s just a kid.” Joyce put a hand on his shoulder and pulled him back before walking over to Kali on the wall.

“Here darling, let’s get you cleaned up. Come on,” Joyce told her, placing a gentle hand on her shoulder. Kali had a hesitant look in her eyes, but didn’t object as the older woman led her upstairs. She didn’t want to give these people a reason to be mad at her. 

Joyce found some of El’s old pajamas and took a hairdryer to her soaked hair to help her warm up. Her hands were still shaking she was so cold.

Once Kali was cleaned up, Joyce sighed. The girl was looking at herself in the mirror, taking the makeup off her face. It looked like it had been there for days. The dark eyeshadow and thick mascara giving her certainly giving her a punk look all on its own.

“Don’t be worried about what Hopper says. Legally, he would be in a lot of trouble if he tried to hurt you.” she placed a hand on Kali’s shoulder, but the girl shrugged away. Physical contact was not her thing.

“I never wanted to hurt any of you. I just wanted to find my sister again.” Kali made eye contact with her in the mirror, trying to keep herself composed.

“I’m not even going to ask how you found us, but just know that we’re going to protect you and keep you safe as long as you stay. Hopper knows people, he can give you a normal life if you show him your worthy of it. I know you can do that, can’t you?” Joyce smiled at Kali, and faintly she did too.

Kali was silent for a few moments.

“I don’t think I could ever be normal, truly. There’s no way to erase what I’ve done, but I don’t regret any of it. Does that make me a horrible person, if I have no remorse for those I killed myself?” 

Joyce didn’t know how to answer that. Murder was not something she had ever really faced. She had seen her loved ones die at the hands of horrid monsters, but for a person to kill with the intention of killing, it was a dark topic that she and no idea how to tackle.

But Kali looked at her like she wanted an answer.

She didn’t know the logistics of why Kali killed. She knew that she did it out of anger, out of revenge. She wanted the bad men gone not just because of what they did to her, and so they didn’t do it to others.

And Joyce could get behind that. It made since. She didn’t just go on killing sprees, she worked hard to put an end to her pain.

“Not regretting your actions doesn’t make you a bad person, Kali. Your not like those men, you never hurt anyone who didn’t deserve it. But here’s the thing, you can be normal. Maybe your past might not be completely erased, but we can give you all the same things El has now.” sh reached down and moved a strand of hair out of Kali’s face. 

After Kali didn’t say anything for a few moments, Joyce spoke again.

“Is that what you want? To be safe a protected like El?” She lowered her volume to a softer tone, trying to convince Kali of something she wasn’t quite sure of herself. Four kids was a lot, but she was willing to take Kali in if she needed it.

Kali didn’t say anything, but just nodded. Joyce smiled.

“Come on, I’m sure you and El have a lot of catching up to do.” Joyce rested a hand on her back and led her downstairs. 

There could be a lot of issues going forward with Kali, but she was going to protect her and keep her safe. She swore by that. And Kali, even if she didn’t say it directly, was thankful for that.


	2. Part II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hopper is kind of freaked out when he can't find Kali anywhere. He calls for her and calls El at Max's, desperately trying to find her. He tells himself it's because having a murderer on the loose is dangerous, but maybe he cares about the kid more than he's willing to let on. Kali and Hopper have a heart-to-heart over lost family members, and Hopper decides he's going to try to replace some of what Kali once lost.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let's pretend the Byers' have a basement. And we're going to go with the head-canon that Kali grew up in England, despite Linnea being Danish. She had a British accent, so that's what I'm going with.

Kali had been living with the Hoppers and Byers for a week now. She was adjusting, slowly. Hopper had began to relax a bit more around Kali, and he was working hard to get her a proper birth certificate. She already had one, as once upon a time she had been a normal kid in London. 

He had looked into sending her back home to her real parents, but had found that her dad had been killed in a car crash when Kali was 9, four years after Kali had been kidnapped. He couldn’t find anything about what happened to her mom. He didn’t have the heart to break the news to her. But he had a feeling she already knew.

So she was living with them, and he was working with Dr. Owen to change her last name and make her a true part of the family. It was too tricky to take it to court to change her last name and go through the entire adoption process. Kali’s situation was special, and they had to keep her safe. 

He hadn’t been fond of the kid at first. She was closed off and reserved. It took him a few days to realize that she was unaccustomed to domestic life. Hell, the girl was homeless up until a week ago.

She and El were sharing a bedroom. Since Hopper and Joyce had married, the Byers small home had become increasingly crowded, and the cabin might as well had been demolished. Will and El had been sharing a room until Kali came along, but now the boys were paired up into a room together.

El was having a sleepover with Max, Will was at Mike’s playing DnD, and Jonathan and Nancy had gone to Indianapolis to buy Christmas presents for the kids with less than a week until the holiday.

So Hopper and Kali were the only ones at home. He had yet to have a real conversation with the kid, she rarely talked to anyone else besides El, or as she called her, Jane.

He walked down the hall to where Kali was in her bedroom. She hadn’t come out for breakfast that morning, which worried him.

“Hey Kid? Can I come in?” he knocked on her bedroom door. He didn’t hear anything from inside.

So Hopper knocked on the door again.

Still no answer.

After the third knock, he got suspicious. 

He didn’t want to invade her privacy, but the dead silence from the other side of the door was worry-some.

He pushed open the door to find the room completely empty. Kali was nowhere to be found. 

He left the room, calling out through the house.

“Kali! Hey kid? You here!?”

She wasn’t anywhere in the house. Joyce was at work, all the kids were out of the house, and he couldn’t find the extremely dangerous child anywhere. As quiet or a sweet as she may be, she had still killed people. He had no idea what she could be doing or where she could be. She hadn’t left the house the past week she had been staying with them, so where could she have gone?

Hopper walked over to the phone and slowly dialed the Hargroves house number. It was written on a notepad taped to the refrigerator (Joyce refused to use magnets anymore after the summer, tape worked just fine.) All of the kids’ friends numbers were there. The Wheelers, the Sinclairs, the Hendersons, all the people’s houses where the kids hung out, in case of any emergencies.

Of course, with just his luck, Billy answered the phone.

“Who’s calling and why?” He clearly was peeved for being interrupted from something. Hopper could hear music playing in the background of the call.

“Hey Billy. This is Hopper, can I speak to El, please?”

Billy just sighed and held the phone away.

“Maxine! Send your friend in here!” Hopper heard him shout.

He couldn’t hear Max’s response, but in a few moments El had the phone.

“What’s up?’ El asked. He could hear Max in the background telling Billy to turn down his music.

“Your sister is missing. I can’t find her anywhere in the house. Please tell me you know where she is.” Hopper was almost positively sure that El would have no idea where Kali had gone, but he had to make sure. 

“Uhhhh… No…” El was quiet now.

“Do you know where she might be?”

“No. She never leaves the house.”

“Okay, just, why don’t you spend another night with Max, okay?”

“But! I can help find her!”

“We haven’t seen signs of your powers coming back in months, El.”

“I can still help look for her…” El grumbled, defeated.

“I don’t need you getting into trouble. I’ve got it under control. Have a good night, Ellie.”

“You too…”

“I love you.”

“I love you too, dad.”

And with that, El hung up.

Back to square one, he had no more information about where Kali could be than he did before.

She didn’t know anyone in Hawkins as far as Hopper knew. He couldn’t think of anywhere she could have gone.

Then there was a crash that came from the basement. The basement. Where all of their junk was, where all the salvageable things from the cabin were, where Sara’s stuff was.

He mad a mad-dash for the door, climbing down the stairs slowly. Why didn’t he check down here before? The kid was curious as hell, of course she would be enticed by a random door at the end of the hallway.

“Kali? You down here?”

Another crash, followed by swearing.

“Yes, I’m here.”

He climbed down the stairs, rounded the corner into the unfinished portion of the basement, where all the clutter was. Only a small section was finished, but it was out-of-commission after a mold infestation last year that had never properly gotten fixed, just because the Byers could never afford it.

Kali was sitting on the concrete floor, a box in front of her. She was going through it.

“What do you have there, kid?” he asked, trying to not scare her off. She wasn’t the most comfortable around him.

“I don’t know.”

It took him a minute to realize what box she was going through. It was a bunch of stuffed animals and books that used to belong to Sara. Of course that was the box she had found.

“Anne of Green Gables?” Hopper’s heart almost stopped when she pulled the worn out book out of the box.

It took Hopper a moment to find his words.

“Yeah. It was my daughters.” No sense in lying to her, she would find out the truth eventually.

“You had a daughter?” Kali seemed genuinely surprised as she started to lower the book back into the box. He took it out of her hands and held it in his lap.

“Her name was Sara. She was eight when she died.” He didn’t want to cry, not today, and not in front of the kid, but somehow she was pulling it out of him.

Kali seemed like she didn’t know what to say. Which she probably didn’t. He didn’t expect her to know how to comfort a grown man.

“My mom died when I was four. A car crash damaged her brain and put her into a coma. I still remember the day. My dad wouldn’t let me be in the room when they pulled the plug, it just cost too much for us to keep her on life support when we knew she would never wake up.”

For the first time since she had started staying with them, he saw Kali shed a tear. She was just a kid. A kid that had seen and been through too much. The worst part was that she could remember a normal life. El never had that before, but Kali did, and Kali had to remember what she lost every day.

“Sara, she had cancer. It was the hardest four months of my life. That’s why I try so hard to protect El, because I can’t lose another.” He shook his head. Kali reached out and laid her hand gently on top of his. Even the tiny gesture was enough to keep him talking.

“I want to keep you safe too, kid.” He made eye contact with her for the first time since he had come down to the basement.

And Kali smiled. He hadn’t seen her smile like that before. All teeth and she actually looked happy.

“Do you think we could start over? I’ll stop thinking of you as a murderer and you stop thinking of my as a ruthless policeman?” He tried to joke, but it was true. They both had unflattering impressions of the other, and this conversation showed him that she really was just looking for love, not to hurt anybody.

“Yes. Yes, we can start over.” Kali nodded.

Hopper put the book back into the box and stood up.

“How do you feel about going to see a movie? I hear  _ Clue  _ is really good.” He held his hand out for her, and she smiled, using his offer to pull herself up off the ground.

“As long as I get to pick the radio station on the way.”   
“I think we can work something out.” Hopper liked joking with Kali,it reminded him of how he used to talk to Sara. El was not easy to take a joke, she just didn’t understand most of the time.

“Race ya to the car?” he asked. A smirk appeared on her face.

Kali began climbing the stairs, racing to find her shoes.

“I didn’t say go!” He laughed, chasing after her. 

Maybe they could make the dysfunctional family work.


	3. Part III

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kali reflects on everything that's happened since El left her back in November of 1984. Jonathan and Kali talk after she has a nightmare. Kali doesn't think she could ever be normal in a small town like Hawkins, but El is determined to change that. She convinces Kali to stay with them to Christmas, and Kali believes for the first time in a long time that she might have found her true home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is not the end of this story, just the finale of this part. There are 6 parts total planned for this series, and they are listed in the series description as of 3 minutes ago. Not that anyone cares, actually.

Kali was kind of a stranger to herself.

She didn’t know who she was. All she had known before was anger and revenge and constant danger.

But now, there was hope and safety. She felt like she was home, more than she ever had with the family she had once found all those years ago.

Here, she had Jane, and Jane’s brothers and father and mother. It felt like a real family.

The night she had arrived, it had been cold. She had wanted to lay low in Hawkins for a while, wait until after the holiday to find Jane. But the snow put a halt in her plans. After everything that had happened, she was all alone, so she went against all her moral instincts and sought out Jane and her family.

It hurt, when her gang left her. They had been all she had, and she watched as they tore themselves apart. They were angry, and that was a feeling Kali could understand. Since the Lab, she had always been angry.

Dottie had been a little rich girl looking for excitement. She was the last to come and the first to go. Kali almost liked watching her leave, she had never been very useful, just whinny.

Mick and Axel stuck around for a little while longer. They helped her find Brenner and plan everything out. In the end she had to be the one to execute the attack alone, and afterwards, they left. Their reasoning hadn’t been very good, but at that point Kali didn’t care.

She had gone through a lot in those past few months after Jane had left them. She had to go back to the man they had tried to kill, because he couldn’t know the truth and track the two girls down again. So she pushed her powers much to far and paid the price. Terrible migraines, seizures, near constant vomiting.

Funshine had told Kali that she needed a hospital, and of course she had refused. She couldn’t afford one, much less put herself through the tourture of one. It was too risky. She couldn’t let herself lose all the little freedom she had left.

Funshine had been the first person in her little group. The first member of her family, perhaps. He had been the one to take her in, actually. All the way back when just after she had left her former family and was an angry thirteen-year-old with no home and nowhere to go.

He had given Kali hope.

That hope hurt worse than any punch, kick, or slap to the face she could have taken.

In the end, she had left him. It hadn’t been without warning, they had thoroughly talked through plans prior.

He had a lot of money saved up. Hell, he was a goddamned trust fund baby with tons of money. She still didn’t know why he chose to live the way he had, out on the streets committing crime. In a small way she was glad.

He had helped her, he had always been nice, and had always been someone to talk to. He had empathy when no one else did.

He had wanted to try to give her a normal life. Kali had declined, because in her heart she knew, as much as she cared about him and he cared about her, Funshine wasn’t true family.

Jane was true family. The sister she was bonded with by trauma stronger than anyone else. Jane was the only person that could give her a home that felt real.

And so she left the last person she had ever taken shelter in, and fled for Hawkins. The one town she had promised herself she would never return to.

Kali hadn’t expected Jane’s family to be so… caring. Maybe that wasn’t the right word, but she didn’t care to find a better one at the moment.

Joyce had immediately taken her in and not questioned her, despite Hopper’s rage. Kali understood where he was coming from, after all. He wasn’t wrong, she was a murderer.

Jonathan and Will hadn’t registered as anything weird in Kali’s brain. She supposed she had to trust them enough. They didn’t seem harmful.

Jane was just so, so happy to see her again. Kali had expected her to be mad, to throw a fit and demand she leave, because Kali was truly a horrible person who had only caused the younger girl and her family pain. At least, that’s how Kali saw the situation.

Although Jane saw it very differently. Kali was a step in her self-discovery process, and Kali soon realized Jane was also a step in her own.

If this family was willing, willing to put her past behind her and truly help her find her place in the world, Kali was all for it.

Kali was an intriguing case, to Jonathan. She was always interesting. He liked to people watch, and she might just be the most fascinating person he had ever kept an eye on.

And she seemed to trust him too, or at least she didn’t think he posed any sort of threat to her.

He tried to be open, and tried to be there for her. 

The first night she stayed at their house, they had put her in his room because El and Will were already sharing. Hopper had pulled out an old air mattress that they piled high with blankets and she seemed content with that. 

When they had gone to bed that first night, he had tried to pry some sort of information out of her, anything at all of interest. She hadn’t said much to him, even as he tried to make conversation with her.

Kali had nightmares that night, thrashing around and muffled screams and silently crying into her blankets. The truth was he had never fallen asleep, he had just been watching Kali silently from his bed, not very sure what he was looking for.

His first reaction was to climb out of bed and kneel beside her. She had her face buried into her pillows as she tried to stifle her crying.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay.” He wasn’t great at comforting people, but he tried. Kali turned her head slowly to face him, the moonlight coming in from the window highlighting her tear-stained cheeks and red-rimmed soft brown eyes.

Kali sniffed, trying to pull herself together.

“Nightmares?”

Kali nodded as she reached up to wipe the tears out of her eyes.

“I get it. We all have them constantly at this point.” Jonathan took one of her hands into his, trying to calm her down.

“It’s just… new places always seem to fuck me up. If I’m not already mentally unstable.” She let out a watery laugh and Jonathan felt bad for her. She had been through so much, if El’s story was anything to go on. Kali didn’t deserve that.

“You’re not fucked up, I promise you that. We’re going to help you, and you can have a normal life.” Jonathan was trying to take her mind off her nightmares, it was the only thing he thought of to do.

Kali was silent for a few moments.

“I think in a way that’s all I want. But after… everything, I don’t think there’s a way I could be normal, not like you or Jane.” She shook her head.

He didn’t know how to answer that. Kali definitely seemed like a girl who was very negative, and he guessed he should have expected that. All life had ever given her was shit, and she didn’t have much hope left.

“Why did you only come to find El now? It’s been over a year since she found you.” He was curious, and 2 am seemed like just as good a time as any to ask.

“Don’t tell Jane, or Hopper, and anyone actually. Okay? I need to be able to trust you.”

“I won’t. My lips are sealed.” He gave her a reassuring smile and she nodded her head once.

“I didn’t care what Jane tried to tell me, I knew Brenner wasn’t dead. And I was right. I needed revenge, and my timing had to be perfect.” Kali was looking him dead in the eye and he was honestly kind of scared.

He didn’t say anything for close to a full minute.

“So you killed him?” He asked it like a question but he was almost certain he already knew the answer.

“Let’s pretend it doesn’t sound as terrible as it actually is.” Kali whispered. She laid her head against the pillow and closed her eyes.

“I like talking to you Jonathan. You listen, no one else does that.” She spoke up just as he thought she had drifted off.

“I like talking to you too. You make me see things differently.” He smiled at her and let go of her hand, climbing back into bed and falling asleep quickly.

El loved her sister, she really, really did. It was just kind of hard to like her sometimes.

Kali pissed her off, not in the normal sibling way by taking her hairbrush or stealing her food, but by her own hatred of herself.

It mad El so mad, that on the fourth day Kali was staying with them, she sat her down on the couch when they were home alone and decided to chew her out.

“Kali!”

“What?” Kali was curled up in a chair in the living room, reading a book that was very large and intimidating to El.

El came stomping into the living room, sitting down on the couch across from Kali.

“We need to talk.”

“Then talk. I’ll listen.”

El took a deep breath.

“You aren’t happy here. I know it. You’re always so sad. I don’t want you to be sad.” El shook her head.

Kali sighed, and shut her book.

“I’m not sad, just… unadjusted.” Kali dropped her gaze to the rug, and El knew there was more behind her dramatic pauses.

“What do you mean?” El was confused. When she had moved in with Hopper, she had been so excited to finally be taken care of and safe that she had fallen into a routine and an order right away. 

“I’m not cut out for a domestic lifestyle anymore. I always say the wrong thing and I can’t make friends and I’m terrible at cooking and cleaning. I just don’t know how to fit in.” Kali was running her fingernail along the side of her thumb, scraping and picking at the skin there until it bled.

“Shit.” she whispered, looking down at the blood dripping off of her skin. 

El hopped off the couch and ran into the kitchen, flinging open the junk drawer and pulling out a band-aid, grabbing a dish towel on her way out.

“Here.” She handed Kali the band-aid and towel, letting the older girl clean herself off.

“That’s not all true. You could make friends, we just have to make it safe first.” El slid down into the large chair next to Kali.

“No one in this tiny town would ever like me. I’m indian and a punk, the opposite of all the perfect model girls here.” Kali was still refusing to make eye-contact with El.

“Kali, look at me.”

Kali glanced at her for a second.

“No, really look at me.

Kali met El’s eyes and looked like she wanted to cry. El’s heart almost shattered, she had only seen her sister like that once before, in Chicago when she ran away and left Kali behind and heart-broken.

El couldn’t help but to hug her. She knew that Kali wasn’t one fond of physical affection, but El was determined for Kali to know how much she meant to her.

She pulled away, meeting Kali’s eyes once again.

“Give me until Christmas. Give me two weeks to show you that you belong here, that this is your home. When the two weeks are over, you can go wherever you want, back to whatever you were doing before. But just give me some time.” El was looking at Kali with the biggest puppy dog eyes she had ever pulled on someone. She was really, truly begging, for more than a candy bar at the Wal-Mart checkout.

“Please?” El grabbed Kali’s hands, pulling them into her own.

Kali bit at her bottom lip, thinking.

“I want to stay, I really do, I just don’t want to be alone anymore.” Kali’s tone was so quiet she was almost inaudible, but El was listening closely.

“You won’t be, not with us.” El reassured her.

“Okay, until Christmas, and then we’ll figure it out from there.” Kali nodded her head, and El beamed.

Hopefully, maybe, possibly, she had found her home, and for once in her life, she could be a normal girl. If it made Jane happy, she would try.

After all, there wasn’t anything Kali wouldn’t do for her real, true family.


End file.
